07/27/2026
In this moment, I was feeling the raw energy of life flowing through me. Overwhelmed with the joy of being human, completely free in my spirit, I felt utter gratitude to be alive. Playing with one of my best friends, being silly, surrounded by friendly dancing strangers at the Rhythm of The People event was pure bliss. And yet, in the exact same moment, just a couple miles away, thousands of people were running for their lives, screaming over the sound of gunfire. Seven people fell victim to a random act of violence, including a child whose life had only just begun. Three of the seven victims have died. How do we maintain joy in a world so riddled with cruelty and injustice? Where do we find the courage to get up each day when we know of the innumerable martyred souls who were robbed of the opportunity to wake up with us? How do we maintain faith in our fellow humans when we are perpetually bombarded with the worst of human nature? How do we love? How do we trust? Last week, I was at the splash park next to the library with my nanny child. As children shouted gleefully, the police draped a yellow plastic sheet over a young man’s body a few hundred feet away. I was again confronted with the extremes of this human experience. The concrete truth of our time here: everyone that lives must die eventually. Death does not concern itself with our ideas of fairness or justice, it is the ever-present companion of our flesh waiting to collect our debt. I have lived most of my life consumed by fear, fury and sorrow over these truths. Unable to find peace in a world that abandons so many beings. As a long-time materialist, I had no faith that our souls would persist beyond death, making this reality intolerable. Over the last year I have been on a journey home to spirit, and now feel there is an existence beyond our material flesh for all beings. I still ache over the injustice and yearn to make this world a better place, but now, I appreciate the opportunity of this existence. [Continued in comments]
